


A Warm Lights in Cold Places

by Prismabird



Category: Twin Peaks
Genre: Alternate Universe, Dissociation, Fluff, Fluff and Angst, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, childhood sexual abuse implied, emotional breakdown, implied alcoholism
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-04-15
Updated: 2018-04-15
Packaged: 2019-04-23 01:41:50
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,231
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/14321757
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Prismabird/pseuds/Prismabird
Summary: Dale comes home and finds it's still all right to start over. Alt universe - Dale Cooper never gets trapped in the Red Room.





	A Warm Lights in Cold Places

**Author's Note:**

> So, there's this fic called [The Roots of the Mountain](https://archiveofourown.org/works/11419197) by atinylemon, and it's criminally underrated, and you should read it. I bring it up because I read it quite a while ago, then wrote this recently and thought, "Huh, that's a little familiar." Turns out, I had accidentally incorporated elements of atinylemon's fic into my own. Mainly, Dale commutes home to Harry and has a breakdown in a bath/shower. The overall fic is different enough that I decided to post mine anyway, and changed the one line that I basically unintentionally stole whole cloth.

Dale Cooper drove north out of Seattle anticipating the moment when his lungs would be free of mud-soup city air and full of the the crisper clearer air of the mountain forests. Never mind that Seattle was, as cities went, a much cleaner alternative to Philadelphia - he was fast losing his knack for city living, though he still dwelt in one more than half the time. Instead he was developing a deep kinship for pine trees, forest trails, and warm wooden cabins, with a generator humming in the back and a warm, flannel-wrapped man humming in the bedroom. In terms of climate, Twin Peaks was no warmer nor drier than Seattle, yet the long drive home always had an effect like salve to a windburn, like clothes straight from the dryer and hot coffee on the couch. Driving from Seattle to Twin Peaks was like a transitional shift in the comfort of his very soul. 

Except today. Dale blasted the heater in his little grey Toyota and gripped the wheel until his fingernails dug in. Every part of him felt tense, perhaps in a reflexive attempt to generate extra warmth. It wasn’t unusually cold for late September, even though the roads shone from the recent rainfall, but Dale was having a hard time finding any body heat at his bones. He shivered, once, then suppressed the instinct. He was not cold. It was not cold in his car, therefore, he would not shiver. 

As the drive went on, Dale kept waiting for the feeling of home to fall over him like a blanket. It flatly refused, which irked him further. His mouth, already naturally downturned, fell into a deeper frown. Normally, he had stronger reign over his emotional responses than this, and especially more control than he’d shown earlier today, in the ... event ... which had him on the road two days before expected. _“What are you planning to tell Harry?”_ he thought, and he did not have an answer. 

By the time Dale passed the familiar wooden welcome sign, almost invisible in the newly fallen darkness, he felt perhaps a little more in control of himself. Or at the very least, he felt very little of anything, which would have to suffice. Pulling into the driveway of Harry’s cabin gave him no sense of joy or peace or nervous dread, only the inclination to throw the car in reverse and drive away, drive to ... where?

“Nowhere,” Dale said to no one, and climbed out of the car. 

Harry was sitting on the couch when Dale walked in. He looked like home defined, wrapped in an orange and navy blanket, a book on his lap, a glass tumbler of hot whiskey in his hand, Old Blue the collie at his feet. “Oh hey!” he said, a little smile turning up his cheeks, already ruddy with alcohol. ‘I drink too much when you’re away,’ Harry’d told him once, and the memory flittered through Dale’s mind like a moth, without connecting to anything.

“Hi Harry,” Dale said, with what he hoped was a convincing smile. He did not see Harry stand up but suddenly Harry was there beside him, pulling him into what must have been a warm hug. Dale tried to feel it and couldn’t. Harry pressed a stubble rough kiss to Dale’s cheek, and Dale hugged him back because it seemed the right thing to do. 

“You’re home early,” Harry said into his shoulder, and Dale responded, “They let me go early,” then “I have to urinate.”

“Okay,” Harry said as they pulled apart. Dale’s eyes focused on the yellow light of the lamp across the room, letting it act as a beacon, guiding him in the right direction. Harry remained by the front door as Dale walked toward the bathroom, though Blue (was she here too?) trailed behind him, sniffing. Dale could not feel just what was wrong, but he could sense it in the silence that followed, the tiny pause before, “Are you all right?”

“All right,” Dale repeated without turning around. “Yes, Harry, I’m all right.” 

Harry did not say anything, so Dale went in and shut the bathroom door. Making quick work of it, he relieved himself, flushed, washed his hands. The mirror hung in front of him, and he found himself staring into his reflection. He stared for a long time. It didn’t look right - he both was and was not staring back at himself, and he felt overcome with the sudden urge to lurch forward and smash his face against the glass.

“Hey, Dale, have you eaten?” Harry called through the door. 

“No,” he replied, though had he? No, no, he had not eaten. He might be hungry. He wasn’t sure. 

“There’s a bunch of Lucy’s lasagna leftover in the fridge, I’ll throw it in the oven. Are you gonna take a shower?”

“Yes,” Dale said before the meaning of Harry’s words registered in his head. Shower. Okay. That made sense. 

Methodically, Dale began to strip his clothes, mentally checking them off as he did so. Jacket. Tie. Watch. Shirt. Shoes. Socks. Belt. Pants. Underwear. He left them in a heap on the floor, removed by hands that didn’t feel like his own, like they were operating without his say so or like someone else entirely was undressing him. He ran them along his naked sides, feeling for the edges of himself, where he stopped. 

He didn’t remember getting into the shower, only found himself standing under hot spray several minutes later. What was he ... what was he doing in here? Why was he in the shower? Was he dirty? What did he do?

“Harry said take a shower,” Dale said aloud, and that was reason enough. While soaping up, he tried to shake the foggy disconnect from his mind - everything felt like it was on a delay, and he was moving like a malfunctioning robot. He stared at his arms, skin deep pink from the heat of the water, and he realized that he wasn’t completely sure they were human anymore. Like if he pulled off his skin, he’d find circuity and metal, not blood. 

“There’s flesh and bone under there,” he said to no one, and even his words felt like they weren’t his own. Then “I have to wake up for Harry.” 

But his fog continued, until a sudden rap on the door broke through a few minutes later. “Dale, are you okay in there?”

Harry’s words took their time getting to his brain, and a beat longer to process. “What?”

“Are you okay honey?”

“Yes.”

“It’s just...you’ve been in there a while. Dinner’s ready.”

“Okay.” 

“Can I come in?”

“Okay.” 

What happened next happened in choppy segments of Dale’s awareness. Water off. Standing on a bath rug. Towel - a towel, soft, green, ruffled through his hair, traced his whole body, a soft, firm pressure that did momentarily give Dale reassurance of his existence. Soft words which he did not hear, but had weight regardless. Anchors. Harry’s words. 

Something plush was wrapped around his shoulders - his bathrobe, and then he was enveloped in Harry’s arms, pressed chest to chest, Harry’s breath on his cheek. “C’mon sweetheart. Let’s get you to bed.” 

Dale was about to protest - bed? He did not want to go to bed - when he became aware of his own body all at once. It shocked him; the ache of it, yes, head to toe, probably the result of hours of full body muscle tension, but more notable and surprising was the press of his erection against Harry’s hip. It was that which finally shook him out of his dissociation, cleared the fog.

Underneath it, he found mild panic.

Finally, _finally_ finding a feeling to hold to, Dale sank into his panic and fought his way out of Harry’s arms. “No, I need -” he said, and then walked out of the bathroom and out of the house before he could finish the thought. 

 

While Dale was in the shower trying to determine if he were real, Harry was in the kitchen, pulling out plates and silverware. He took another long swallow of his whiskey and refilled the glass before donning a pair of mitts and taking the lasagna from the oven, a fond grin on his face. With Dale gone, Harry rarely bothered with a home-cooked meal, but Lucy had a way of looking out for him. “You know, Sheriff Truman, you just don’t take very good care of yourself when it’s only you at home,” she’d said, handing him the pyrex dish. She was cooking and baking a lot, Andy had told him, and he was just as happy to get her to give some of it away. “Not that I don’t appreciate her cooking, Harry, you understand. But I’m starting to gain weight. That’s all fine for her, eating for two and all, but as an officer of the law, I should think of my physique.” Harry had to agree.

Singing a little to himself, he called out to Dale in between verses of _“Wichita Lineman”_ and went in search of a bottle of wine. Dale looked like he could use a glass or three. Odd business his being here in the middle of the week, not that Harry would ever turn down a second of extra time with Dale, but whatever had brought him home early had clearly left him shaken. 

Speaking of ... “Dale?” Harry located a bottle of rose` in the vegetable crisper - huh - and placed it out on the counter, taking a quick second to swallow another sip of his own drink. “Dale, dinner’s ready.” No answer. Faintly, he could hear the sound of the shower still running. A tug of alarm pulled deep in his stomach, and he swallowed, walking toward the bathroom door. He rapped his knuckles three times. “Dale, are you okay in there?”

There was a pause that seemed to hang in the air. “What?”

“Are you okay honey?”

“Yes.”

“It’s just,” Harry swallowed. Dale didn’t sound right, and he felt the alarm in his stomach turned into a siren, “...you’ve been in there a while. Dinner’s ready.”

“Okay.” 

No, it wasn’t. “Can I come in?”

“Okay.” 

The door was unlocked. Dale rarely locked it. Wisps of steam billowed out at Harry as he entered the bathroom, shower still running full. No hesitation - Harry was now a man on a mission. He pulled the shower curtain back. 

Harry wasn’t really sure what he expected to see, but Dale standing stock still under tortuously hot water, skin shiny and ruddy pink, staring straight ahead at nothing was both more and less disturbing than his imagination. He reached in, dampening the cuff of his flannel, and switched off the water. “Honey, what are you doing?” he asked, voice a little rough. 

“...shower,” Dale replied, looking at him and not seeing him. His voice, too, sounded rough. Harry searched his face for evidence that he’d been crying, but with flushed cheeks and shower wet skin, it was hard to say. 

“I think your shower’s done now,” Harry said. He place a hand on Dale’s arm, guiding him out of the tub and onto the bath mat. “Let’s get you dried off and cozy, okay?” Harry took a fluffy towel out from the cabinet behind him and started on Dale’s hair, his face, his shoulders. “Can you talk to me? Did something bad happen today?”

Dale didn’t answer him, and Harry didn’t ask again. Instead, he dried Dale top to bottom, murmuring little comforts and platitudes. “Whatever’s wrong, it’s all right now. It’s all right.” He bent down, dried Dale’s legs, his feet. “You’re home now. I’ll make it all right.” 

Dale’s bath robe hung on a hook behind them.It was the sort of luxurious royal blue robe a person might wear in a fancy spa, and Harry liked leaving it out even when Dale was away, because it was pretty and rich and a reminder that Dale would be home soon, safe and comfortable. Harry took it now and wrapped it around Dale’s shoulders, helping him pull his arms into the sleeves. “That’s it.” 

Harry looked up, studied him. Dale’s eyes were shut, not tightly, but like he was lost in thought or meditation, and he swayed slightly, as if to music that only he could hear. The movement, though slight, caused his robe to open a little in the front. He was aroused, Harry noted, a detail which calmed him considerably, even coaxed a smile. Dale may have come home distressed and upset, but his body was giving into exhaustion now - he was asleep on his feet, complete with nocturnal erection to prove it. 

A strong protective energy rose in Harry, and he pulled Dale tight to him, cupping a hand behind his head. “All right. Whatever it is, we can fix it tomorrow. C’mon, sweetheart, let’s get you to bed.”

They stayed like that for a moment, and just when Harry was about to dance Dale into their bedroom, he felt the whole of Dale’s physicality shift, a slump, softening of his muscles, followed by a sudden tensing, as if a current of electricity had run through him from feet to head. 

And then Dale began to thrash. Not violently, but enough to get Harry to let go in shock. In front of him, Dale came awake, came to life for the first time since returning home, really looked at him for the first time, and Harry’s breath caught at the shock in his eyes. 

Dale spoke once, said “No, I need-” and walked out of the house before Harry could so much as think to call his name. 

 

It wasn’t freezing out, not yet, but the night’s temperature had dipped significantly, and  
a thin drizzle hung in the cold mountain air. Harry followed Dale out into the darkness, though thankfully he didn’t need to follow him far. Dale sat on the bottom porch step, hair still wet, clad in only his robe, which he’d not even bothered to fully close. Harry glanced down - the cold air had done its work on one part of Dale’s anatomy, and he intended to get his partner in and warm before it started working elsewhere. 

“I should - I want to be alone,” Dale said without turning around. 

“I’m not sure that’s a good idea, but if you have to be alone, at least do it in the house.” 

“I need some air.”

“Sure. But you don’t need pneumonia. Listen to me and get back inside.” 

“No.”

Harry felt his mood drop a notch, from worried to irritated. The whiskey didn’t help. “You’re being stubborn.”

Dale replied, “I’m exercising my right to bodily autonomy.”

“Come on, now, I don’t want you to get sick!”

“No need for concern. You know Harry, there are Tibetan yogis who can regulate and maintain homeostasis of body temperature in the Himalayan snow.”

Harry shook his head in disbelief. “What is this, Dale? You want to Yogi yourself to death? Well that’s fine.” He sat down on the step beside him. “I’ll Yogi to death right with you, then.” 

“I said I want to be alone,” Dale said.  
“Too bad, I’m exercising my right to bodily autonomy. I have as much right to freeze on this step as you do.” More, he almost added, but didn’t, because even annoyed, even drunk, Harry would never so much as imply that this house was anything less than one-hundred percent Dale’s home too. 

It didn’t matter. Apparently, Dale didn’t feel that way. “I guess I’d better go then,” he said, getting up and walking toward the driveway. He held his head high, projecting an aura of calm superiority, and was obviously working hard on it which might explain why he didn’t hear Harry rush up behind him and grab him around the waist. “What - Harry!” Dale shouted, air rushing out of him in a whoosh as Harry tried to hoist him up and carry him back into the house. He managed two steps before Dale, not as strong but well trained and sober, contorted himself into a ball, then launched his bare foot off of Harry’s thigh. Harry cried out. The both of them went down into the wet grass. 

“God _damn_ it, Harry! Just let me leave!” Dale cried, scrambling to his feet, and racing for the car. 

“No!” Harry shouted back, still sitting in the grass. “I can’t just let you drive off wet, and half naked, and exhausted, you ... you irrational, arrogant jack ass! Please, just stop and think this through.”

Dale stood by his Toyota, fingers on the handle, stock still. He said nothing.

“I swear, I’ll arrest you if I have to.”

“On what charge?” Dale asked. 

Harry nodded at Dale’s open robe. “Public indecency.” Dale narrowed his eyes at him, but pulled the robe closed. Still, he did not get in the car. 

For a moment Harry thought he had won, but realized the truth at the same time that Dale spoke it. “I need my keys,” Dale said, storming past Harry. He stopped, turned back. Offered a hand up. 

Harry took it. “Please, Dale. You don’t have to do this...whatever this is. Just come back inside. Stay. At least until morning.” 

Again, Dale had no answer for him. 

“Is there somewhere you need to be that badly?”

“I can’t stay here.”“Why?”

“Because I was fired.”

“What?” Harry straightened up, feeling like his whole head had lit up with a switchboard worth of questions, and he couldn’t figure out which to take first. “What - what happened? Why does that mean you can’t stay here?”  
“Well, technically I haven’t been fired, not yet. Suspended, but it’s my second time this year, so...”

“Why were you suspended?”

“I lost my temper and ... loudly castigated my supervisor.”  
Harry said nothing and waited. 

Dale looked away. “And I may have kicked over a table.” 

“That doesn’t sound like you,” Harry replied. 

“I’m not feeling a lot like myself these days,” Dale said, “which is why it’s a good idea for me to leave. I don’t think I’ve got it in me to be much good for anyone right now. I don’t want to do that to you.” 

“Do _what_ to me? Be sad in front of me? Be yourself? Be something less than an enlightened, perfect intellectual?” Harry breathed deep, sighed for a long time. “Do you mean that you don’t want me to take care of you?” 

“You shouldn’t have to do that.” 

“Yeah? What if it would be my pleasure? What if I want nothing more than to take you back inside and get you dressed and wrap you up in a blanket and hand feed you hot lasagna on the couch? Hmm? Would that be so bad?” Dale looked at his feet, but before he ducked his head, Harry caught sight of his mouth turning down _hard,_ tears in his eyes. “I’m not sure.”

“Would you give it a try?”

Dale sighed. 

“For me? Will you try?”

“All right, Harry.”

 

Half an hour later, Harry was back at his spot on the couch, one arm thrown around Dale, who was lounging against his chest. Both of them were warm and dry and full, clad in pajamas and wrapped in a big flannel blanket, drifting in the dim yellow light of the almost mute television. Harry let his hand play in Dale’s hair, which was soft and messy with the gel washed out. “I love you,” Harry whispered against the top of Dale’s head. 

“Love you,” Dale said softly, then, “I’m sorry I kicked you.”

“That’s all right. It was a bad day.” 

“Hmm,” Dale agreed. 

“What happened?”

“I already told you.” 

“You said you kicked a table over. Why?” 

“They -” Dale breathed deep. “It was a hard case, Harry. I’ve never -” 

“What was it?”

“Child trafficking,” Dale said, and Harry felt a chill run through him. “There were video tapes. Dozens and dozens of video tapes. And we had to go through all of them.” 

“Oh my god,” Harry breathed. 

“God had nothing to do with this,” Dale replied, and if he sounded a little curt, Harry guessed he couldn’t blame him for it. “We went in shifts, and I sat in all morning with this agent - this old, jaded, stone-hearted goblin who kept making _jokes_. I felt like I was about to vomit, and he kept making glib comments about the children’s _faces_. About the _faces_ they made when it was happening to them.” Dale’s breathing kicked up and Harry wanted to tell him no, it’s okay, you don’t have to do this, you don’t have to relive this, but he didn’t. 

“Harry, they looked so scared! And this monster didn’t even see that! It was like he didn’t understand - like he couldn’t see,” Dale’s voice became like a tight wire, “like he didn’t understand how scary it is when it happens to you, and I couldn’t - I - I wanted to scream, and I couldn’t!” 

Time stopped. Harry would swear on it. In that moment, he and Dale were all that existed, and even time had left them. And then he breathed, and it came back, and with it were a thousand sentiments and platitudes and even denials, all in his head. He ignored every last one, because this was delicate, this was Dale needing him to be perfect just once, needing him to say, “I hear you,” without saying it. Needing, “I hear what you’re telling me without telling me, and I believe you, and I love you,” without using any of those words. Gently, he increased the pressure of his arms around Dale’s chest, rocked them both back and forth a few times and said “It was scary, when it happened to you.”

Dale’s nod was almost imperceptible, yet it was enough to shatter Harry’s heart into a million pieces. He leaned forward, let his forehead rest in Dale’s hair and rocked again. Above him, Dale’s breath was controlled, measured, just slightly shakier than usual. For anyone but Harry, it wouldn’t have seemed like he was crying at all. 

“You’re here with me now,” Harry said. “You stay with me, darlin.”

“I don’t think I can do my job anymore,” Dale sniffled. 

“Then don’t. Stay here with me. “

“I was supposed to be ...” he trailed off. “I’m sorry. I shouldn’t be letting this affect me so strongly. It was so much worse for them than it was for me, I shouldn’t be this affected.” 

It took Harry a second to realize that Dale was referring to the children from the tapes and comparing his experience to theirs, and it hit Harry in the gut harder than anything said so far. He actually lost his air for a second. “Oh ... oh, no, Dale, there’s no ‘who had it worse.’ Sweetheart, all of it is worse. Any of it is the worst.” 

Silence followed. At first, Harry thought that Dale might start really spilling his guts about it, go into details, and he braced himself but the story did not come. It did not come for a long time, actually, not until he and Dale were both in their fifties, having lived for nearly two decades worth of anniversaries and compromises and fights and interventions and adoration. One night, early into their middle age, Dale would sit up in bed, crying out from a bad dream. And that night he’d tell, though Harry’d have already guessed half of the details. He knew what Dale struggled with in the bedroom, and so he knew without knowing. 

“Friend of my uncle. A dentist out of Baltimore, and I’m pretty sure my uncle was deep into him for gambling debts, though I didn’t guess that at the time.” A pause, and then, “I wonder how much he got for me.” Dale would say this almost casually, and it was Harry who’d cry that time, face pressed into his pillow, because it was the worst sentence in the world. But that was years and years away. 

For now, there was only quiet while Dale processed Harry’s words, a validation that he hadn’t known he’d been waiting for, and it wasn’t much, just a balm to a deep wound, but it felt something like the start of healing. “I’m going to put in for my resignation tomorrow morning,” Dale said after a while. “I suspect they’ll be overjoyed to see the last of me.”

“Their loss, my gain,” Harry murmured against Dale’s hair. “You want to come work at the sheriff’s office with me?”

“Yes,” Dale agreed, the soft sound of a smile in his voice for the first time that day. “I would like that. But, Harry, I also want to keep exploring my vocational options. I’d never really let myself consider it, but it’s possible that law enforcement is simply not meant for me.”

Harry, too, smiled. “I can see you living as a guru, teaching enlightenment to the whole Pacific Northwest.” 

“Hmm. That might take a lifetime. I’ve found them to be a stubborn people. I’m still working on getting one of their hard-headed sheriffs to meditate daily.”  
“I know, I’m working on it,” Harry laughed.

“No, I think I’ll see where my heart leads me,” Dale said, turning his head and letting his cheek rest against Harry’s chest. “It’ll be fine, so long as I’m home.”


End file.
